There let my native plank shift me to land And I'll be happy: thus I'll leap ashore, Joyful and fearless, on th' immortal coast, Since all I leave is mortal, and it must be lost.

TO THE REV. MR. BENONI ROWE.

THE WAY OF THE MULTITUDE.

RowE, if we make the crowd our guide
Through life's uncertain road,

Mean is the chase; and wandering wide
We miss the immortal good;

Yet if my thoughts could be confin'd
To follow any leader-mind,

I'd mark thy steps, and tread the same:
Drest in thy notions I'd appear

Not like a soul of mortal frame,
Nor with a vulgar air.

Men live at random and by chance,
Bright reason never leads the dance,
Whilst in the broad and beaten way
O'er dales and hills from truth we stray;
To ruin we descend, to ruin we advance:
Wisdom retires; she hates the crowd,

And with a decent scorn

Aloof she climbs her steepy seat,
Where nor the grave nor giddy feet
Of the learn'd vulgar or the rude

Have e'er a passage worn.

Q

Mere hazard first began the track,
Where custom leads her thousands blind,

In willing chains and strong;

There's scarce one bold, one noble mind,
Dares tread the fatal error back:

But hand in hand ourselves we bind,

And drag the age along.

Mortals, a savage herd, and loud

As billows on a noisy flood
In rapid order roll:

Example makes the mischief good:
With jocund heel we beat the road,

Unheedful of the goal.

Me let Ithuriel's friendly wing

Snatch from the crowd, and bear sublime

To wisdom's lofty tower,
Thence to survey that wretched thing,
Mankind; and in exalted rhyme

Bless the delivering power.

TO THE REV. MR. JOHN HOWE

1704.

GREAT man, permit the muse to climb

And seat her at thy feet,

Bid her attempt a thought sublime,

And consecrate her wit.

* Ithuriel is the name of an angel in Milton's Paradise

Lost.

I feel, I feel th' attractive force
Of thy superior soul;

My chariot flies her upward course,

The wheels divinely roll.

Now let me chide the mean affairs
And mighty toil of men:

How they grow grey in trifling cares,
Or waste the motions of the spheres
Upon delights as vain!

A puff of honour fills the mind,
And yellow dust is solid good;
Thus, like the ass of savage kind,
We snuff the breezes of the wind,
Or steal the serpent's food.

Could all the choirs

That charm the poles

But strike one doleful sound,

'Twould be employed to mourn our souls, Souls that were fram'd of sprightly fires, In floods of folly drown'd.

Souls made of glory seek a brutal joy;

How they disclaim their heavenly birth,

Melt their bright substance down with drossy earth,

And hate to be refin'd from that impure alloy.

Oft has thy genius rous'd us hence

With elevated song,

Bid us renounce this world of sense,
Bid us divide th' immortal prize

With the seraphic throng:

"Knowledge and love make spirits blest, Knowledge their food, and love their rest;"

But flesh, th' unmanageable beast,

Resists the pity of thine eyes,

And music of thy tongue.

Then let the worms of groveling mind
Round the short joys of earthly kind
In restless windings roam;
Howe hath an ample orb of soul,

Where shining worlds of knowledge roll,
Where, love, the centre and the pole,
Completes the heaven at home.

THE DISAPPOINTMENT AND RELIEF.

VIRTUE, permit my fancy to impose

Upon my better pow'rs;

She casts sweet fallacies on half our woes,

And gilds the gloomy hours.

How could we bear this tedious round

Of waning moons and rolling years,

Of flaming hopes and chilling fears,

If (where no sovereign cure appears)
No opiates could be found?

Love, the most cordial stream that flows,

Is a deceitful good:

Young Doris, who nor guilt nor danger knows,

On the green margin stood,

Pleas'd with the golden bubbles as they rose,

And with more golden sands her fancy pav'd the flood:

Then fond to be entirely blest,

And tempted by a faithless youth,

As void of goodness as of truth,
She plunges in with heedless haste,

And rears the nether mud:

Darkness and nauseous dregs arise

O'er thy fair current, love, with large supplies

Of pain, to teaze the heart, and sorrow for the eyes, The golden bliss that charm'd her sight

Is dash'd, and drown'd, and lost : A spark, or glimmering streak at most, Shines here and there, amidst the night, Amidst the turbid waves, and gives a faint delight.

Recover'd from the sad surprise,
Doris awakes at last,

Grown, by the disappointment, wise;
And manages with art th' unlucky cast;
When the low'ring frown she spies
On her haughty tyrant's brow,
With humble love she meets his wrathful eyes,
And makes her sovereign beauty bow;
Cheerful she smiles upon his grizly form;
So shines the setting sun on adverse skies,
And paints a rainbow on the storm.
Anon she lets the sullen humour spend,
And with a virtuous book or friend,
Peguiles th' uneasy hours:
Well-colouring every cross she meets,
With heart serene she sleeps and eats,
She spreads her board with fancied sweets,
And strews her bed with flow'rs.

THE HERO'S SCHOOL OF MORALITY.

THERON, amongst his travels, found
A broken statue on the ground:
And searching onward as he went
He trac'd a ruin'd monument.